


Don't stop (I like what you're doing).

by gyufan2303



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, I really love when Kageyama and Hinata insult each other, Insecure Yamaguchi, Mention Of Homophobia, Slight insecure Tsukishima, Yamaguchi exploring his friendships with everyone, i really love kageyama, in which I mean their friendship is all good, no romance for yamaguchi but he doesn't want any right now so its's good, yachi is great
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-04-20
Packaged: 2018-03-24 23:23:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3788161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gyufan2303/pseuds/gyufan2303
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If this was Tsukishima, he’d get a harsh reprimanding of ‘Pay attention this time, Yamaguchi. I have better things to be doing than teaching you a basic beginner’s move.’ Kageyama just glares a little and retrieves another ball.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't stop (I like what you're doing).

**Author's Note:**

> funny story, kurotsukki is actually my notp coz 1. i dont like either of them and 2. i feel like yamaguchi would be super lonely if it happened. so of course i had to write a fic to reconcile this awful outcome in my head and reassure myself. yamaguchi might be a little ooc

Kageyama is a terrible teacher.

“A jump serve is just, you hit it up and then jump and then PAH, and make it go where you want it to go.” At least he only looks mildly constipated, rather than a full on scowl.

“How high should I throw it up?”

“As high as you need to.”

“How high is that?”

“I don’t know. Ask Coach.”

“But he told me to ask you.”

Now Kageyama is scowling.

“Can’t explain this stuff, just watch me and try to copy. That’s how I learned.”

‘I’m not a genius,’ Yamaguchi wants to shout.

After winning a national championship, Coach Ukai decided to stick it out for another year and get another national title to rub in his gramps’ face. Part of his strategy is turning Yamaguchi into some kind of serve expert, up to the calibre of Ubugawa High School. Yamaguchi still gets chills from watching clips of Oikawa so he’s not sure how that’s going to work out but Coach is insistent.

“You don’t have a natural talent for this but you’re prepared to work hard and serving is something in which hard work always pays off. You’ll be fine.” Cue patented Ukai Keishin evil mastermind grin. “Kageyama can work with you.”

So here they are, at six thirty on Thursday morning, Yamaguchi still rubbing the sleep from his eyes. They have about twenty minutes before other people start showing up. Kageyama stands in front of the net and does his special ball forehead touch that no one, not even Hinata, has asked him about, though they all want to know. He throws the ball up and it sails gracefully above his head before coming down again and meeting his palm with a resounding smack and landing on the other side of the court.

“Sorry... I was watching the ball instead of you, can you do it again?” Yamaguchi cringes a little, trying to shrink himself. If this was Tsukishima, he’d get a harsh reprimanding of ‘Pay attention this time, Yamaguchi. I have better things to be doing than teaching you a basic beginner’s move.’ Kageyama just glares a little and retrieves another ball. He gets back into position and forgoes the forehead ritual this time, just bounces the ball a couple of times.

“Why didn’t you touch it to your forehead this time?” Yamaguchi blurts out without meaning to.

“Ah, sorry, never mind, it’s probably something really personal, you don’t need to answer that, I’m sorry,” he rambles, talking more to the ball in Kageyama’s hand than Kageyama himself. He really hopes Kageyama doesn’t have the same reaction to being asked personal questions as Tsukishima does.

“It’s. Just something I do. To get a better feel of the ball,” Kageyama mutters, blushing. “Oikawa used to do it.” And then it’s Kageyama’s turn to look like he’s just blurted out something he really, really didn’t want to say.

“Pay attention to me this time.”

Yamaguchi nods. Kageyama bounces the ball twice, and then throws it up. Yamaguchi forces himself to look at the whole picture this time, like he had to with Shimada’s demonstrations. He looks at the distance between the ball and Kageyama at it’s apex, he sees how much spring Kageyama puts into the jump, he estimates how much power Kageyama swings his arm with, and he makes note of the angle. It’s more of an aesthetic observation than scientific, like he’s building a model out of random words and images in his head to see how he can adapt Kageyama’s moves to his.

“Okay. I want to try again,” he says quietly. He takes a ball from the trolley and gets into position once Kageyama’s moved out of the way. He bounces the ball a couple of times to get a feel of the weight and tries to picture how the serve will play out in his head. He throws it up and is satisfied with the distance. The jump doesn’t fit though, and he knows as he brings his hand down that the ball will hit the net. A tendril of self loathing takes residence in Yamaguchi’s stomach when he hears the decisive swish of the ball hitting the net. These are the moments he dreads the most – when the serve hits the net. Somehow it’s so much worse than when the serve goes out of bounds. Maybe because most of Yamaguchi’s life feels like he’s constantly running into nets rather than successfully jumping over them to get to where he wants to be.

“Try again.” He feels a smack on his back and lets out a strangled yelp, jumping away from Kageyama. Nobody touches Yamaguchi like that. Kageyama doesn’t touch anyone except Hinata like that. His mind goes blank.

“Sorry. I do it when Hinata screws up so. Habit.” Kageyama looks like he wants the floor to swallow him.

“Uh, it’s fine, you just surprised me.” Yamaguchi tries to smile but it comes out like more of a grimace. He wordlessly turns and fetches another ball, trying to ignore the phantom palm on his back. He wonders what it would be like if Tsukishima  would ever touched him like that, like they were rough housing or if he was ever trying to encourage Yamaguchi and just hit too hard in enthusiasm. He can’t imagine it. He doesn’t hate how it feels though. It’s warm. Like one of Hinata’s smiles or Sugawara’s compliments.

Standing at the line again, Yamaguchi goes through the serve in his head, readjusting for the jump. The truly troublesome part is the angle but the angle in the jump float serve is more difficult so he’s a little less worried about that.

He bounces the ball twice, jumps, and hits it over the net. A perfectly acceptable jump serve.

“Nice. Needs a little more power but we have time to work on that.” Kageyama gets to work setting up the rest of the nets for the three on three practices they are having this morning and after school.

“Thanks,” Yamaguchi says brightly. It’s been a good start to the day.

 

School is boring, as usual. Calculus is awful, he’s dreading the hours he’s going to have to spend going over this with a tutor. He feels bad for not being able to walk to school this morning with Tsukishima so he apologises in their English class.

“It’s okay. I want to skype with Kuroo-san in the mornings so I won’t be able to walk with you from now on anyways. It worked out pretty well today.” Tsukishima goes back to flicking through his textbook while Yamaguchi tries to think past the sudden, crushing loneliness.

He makes up an excuse about finishing an assignment to avoid sitting with Tsukishima during lunch and goes to the gym, to work on more serves. Unfortunately, Kageyama, Hinata, and Yachi are already there, having spiking practice. Kageyama is yelling and Hinata is squawking back while Yachi looks half concerned and half amused. She spots him and calls out while they bicker.

“Oh, Yamaguchi kun! What are you doing here?”

Yamaguchi stiffens and starts stammering excuses about thinking about getting some more serving practice in since the jump serve he did this morning wasn’t terrible and he thinks he can improve it some more in a few weeks if he practises more regularly and he didn’t mean to disturb them –

“Oi. Calm down.” Hinata elbows Kageyama in the side. “Be nicer, Kageyama.”

“Shut up, dumbass. I was being nice.”

“No, you were being a tyrant, like always.”

“Using a fancy word once in a while doesn’t make you any smarter.”

“You wanna fight?!”

“I can literally pick you up and throw you.”

“I’ll show you throwing –”

“Which serve are you practising, Yamaguchi-kun?”

He flinches, having almost forgotten about Yachi’s presence. “Uh, the jump serve.” He rubs the back of his neck nervously. “Coach wants me to be a more effective pinch server.”

“That’s great,” Yachi declares, beaming at him. “You were so cool last year, it’ll make Karasuno really amazing if you get even better.” Yamaguchi’s heart races, the blood rushes to his face. He’s so happy for a moment, he can’t help but grin back at her, even as the fear of letting her and the rest of the team down again works it’s way into his stomach, threatening to make him nauseous. She’s so cute, he wants to hug her but he’s not sure if he can so he pats her head gently instead, spurred on by her confidence in him.

“Thank you, Yachi-san.” She blushes sweetly and gives him a playful wink and thumbs up.

He gets a ball and goes to the court, standing a couple of feet away from where Kageyama and Hinata are still bickering. He bounces the ball twice, goes through the serve in his head, and hits the ball. The angle is wrong and the ball goes too far. The rush from a moment ago quickly dissipates into disappointment and a little shame. This day has gone from good to bad far too many times for his liking, he feels emotionally wrung out and more and more anxious and self conscious with every passing hour.

“Too much power is better than too little.” He looks up to see Kageyama’s encouraging look. Well, as encouraging a look as he can give while having to accommodating his signature scowl and the fact that he has a squirming Hinata in a head lock.

Yamaguchi nods at him, fired up in a way that he hasn’t been since he first saw Shimada’s serve at the Neighbourhood association practice game.

Yachi calls out “Try again, Yamaguchi-kun!” and throws him another ball from the trolley. He catches it and gets ready to try again.

“Hey, try to look like having more fun! Its volleyball!” Hinata wheezes from under Kageyama’s arm. Yamaguchi giggles a little despite himself and turns to face the net again. On a whim, he decides to smile while he hits this serve, just as a joke. It goes perfectly and the excited yells of his three – friends, he thinks in awe – are almost as encouraging as the feeling of successfully executing a new move. He wishes Tsukishima were here to tell him he did a good job.

“Hinata, come to our practice tomorrow morning. You can practise your receives with his serves.”

“Hey, don’t go deciding things for me, asshole!”

Yamaguchi just grins at them.

 

He’s excited as he walks into the gym the next morning, which means he’s probably going to fail and disappoint himself and the other two boys but he can’t help feeling a just a little confident. He’d done quite a few successful jump serves at practice yesterday and Coach had been very pleased. Even Tsukishima had looked a little impressed, saying ‘nice, Yamaguchi,’ once.

Hinata and Kageyama are talking softly as they set up the nets.

“... just going to play volleyball and see how far that takes me.”

“You really think that’ll work?”

“Of course.”

“You think I can do that? Make it to the world stage?”

“Dumbass, we’re both going to make it to the world stage. I’m not letting you quit without an Olympic gold medal.”

Hinata just stares at Kageyama for a moment before tackling him to the ground and hugging him firmly.

“Dumbass! That hurt!”

Yamaguchi’s about to walk out before they notice him, not wanting to disturb their intimate moment, but Kageyama sees him.

“Hey, Yamaguchi, what do you wanna do after high school?” He says this while still on the ground with Hinata clinging to him so Yamaguchi’s a bit more flustered than usual with his answer.

“Uh, um, I, I kind of want to... be an accountant.”

Hinata’s head shoots up. “EH?? Why would you wanna do something boring like that?”

“I like it. How everything can always add up if you do right,” he says, clutching his elbows and looking at the ground. He’s only told his parents about this and Shimada about this. It’s weird that they know something about him that Tsukishima doesn’t. He only took accounting because he wanted to be in the class with Tsukishima but Tsukishima left so late that he didn’t get the chance to swap out as well. And he ended up quite enjoying it so if he does it for a career, it’ll be like he’s carrying with him a part of the good luck he’s had from being Tsukishima’s friend. That’s a secret he’s going to take to his grave.

“Don’t insult people’s life choices, dumbass.” Kageyama pushes Hinata off him and continues setting up the net.

“Get a new insult!”

Yamaguchi smiles while he gets the trolley from the storage shed.

“Say Yamaguchi,” Hinata says. “What’s Tsukishima going to do after we graduate?”

“Tsukki? I don’t know. He always says he’s not sure when I ask.” Yamaguchi wonders if he’s told Kuroo what he’s going to do.

“Eh, whatever. Lets practise!”

 

He avoids lunch with Tsukishima again, texting him about having to meet with the guidance counsellor. He’s not sure why he’s so reluctant to be alone with Tsukishima but he’s going to put off thinking about it by practising serves and even (badly) attempting spikes with Kageyama and Hinata while being cheered on by Yachi. It hurts to think about their friendship, more now than when he’d found out that Tsukishima was getting special mentoring at the Tokyo training camp – when it had felt (stupidly, unfoundedly) like Tsukishima was leaving him behind. It’s easier not to feel nauseous when he can barely hear himself think over Hinata and Kageyama’s yelling. He’s exhausted by all his anxiousness and very ready for the weekend.

 

On Saturday morning he gets a text from Hinata inviting him to a study group at Kageyama’s house. Usually he plays video games with Tsukishima on a Saturday but Tsukishima had texted him that he was going to be in Tokyo for the whole two days so he has nothing to do. He’s never studied with anyone but Tsukishima and Akiteru before. He’s going to be surprised if they actually get anything done before Hinata and Kageyama give up and demand to go outside and play volleyball.

Yachi turns out to be a surprisingly strict teacher, and he suspects that Hinata and Kageyama learned more in these four hours than they have in the entire week that they spend sleeping through classes. Between them, they go through five bags of chips and a plate of cookies baked by Kageyama’s very sweet, not scowling, mother and make significant progress, despite all the whining and groaning. Yamaguchi likes to trade grins with Yachi whenever either of the dynamic duo makes a particularly amusing point in their argument. Kageyama’s dad, again not scowling so it’s a mystery where he gets it from, helps him with his calculus and makes everything clearer than even if he was learning it from Tsukishima. He’s profusely grateful, and the man looks a little embarrassed by Yamaguchi’s earnest thanks.

He’s very happy but he misses Tsukishima a lot. This is the longest they’ve gone without talking face to face since the last summer of middle school and it feels like a part of him is missing. Tsukishima hasn’t said anything though. What if... what if he’s happy that they’re both getting a little space from each other? What if he’s relieved that Yamaguchi isn’t hanging around him anymore? What if... he’s been waiting for Yamaguchi to leave him alone? Is that possible? It’s not like Tsukishima’s the type to tolerate his presence if he doesn’t want him around, but why hasn’t he said anything? Has Kuroo replaced him completely? The doubts keep circling in his head. A few tears leak from his eyes when he’s in bed and he has to put on head phones and play music really loudly – his own playlist, not one of Tsukishima’s – to make himself unable to think, before the panic renders him totally helpless.

 

Yamaguchi is both anticipating and dreading their first class together on Monday. He’s desperate to talk to Tsukishima after so many days. Tsukishima walks into the classroom despondently like he always does but his face hardens when he sees Yamaguchi, into almost a glare. Yamaguchi’s veins turn to ice. Tsukishima sits down and takes out his books.

“How’s serve practice going?”

“It – it’s good, Tsukki, I can get it right at least half the time now and it’s hitting the net a lot less so I’m happy –”

“Good.” Tsukishima turns his attention to his book. Yamaguchi takes deep breaths and thinks of Yachi’s smile and Hinata’s voice and Kageyama’s serves to keep the sadness at bay.

He tentatively follows Tsukishima out the door at lunch time.

“What, no ridiculous excuse so you can go hang out with your new best friends in the gym today?” Yamaguchi flinches at the venom in Tsukishima’s voice.

“Tsukki, I’m sorry about – ”

“Why, exactly, did you feel the need to get away from me so badly?”

“I – I just needed some space, Tsukki. I’m still getting used to the fact that you have a boyfriend.” He doesn’t dare to look at Tsukishima’s face, focusing on his new, shiny sneakers instead.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s just – it’s been just us for so long, I needed a little time to get used to how – how I’m not going to be your closest, uh, non family person anymore. Kuroo-san is.” His voice cracks a little and he’s so ashamed.

“I just got really insecure and I figured that if you weren’t saying anything, it wasn’t bothering you, and I’m really sorry and I missed you so much, and then I thought that maybe you liked me not hanging around you all the time so I – tried to give you space over the weekend.”

There’s an incredibly uncomfortable silence in the now empty hallway.

“I thought that you didn’t like – the fact that I have a boyfriend.” Yamaguchi gapes at him, horrified.

“Tsukki, no!” He clutches Tsukihima’s arm and looks up at him desperately. “How could you think like that? Do you – do you really think so little of me? Of course I don’t think badly of you having a boyfriend! I’ve known you were gay since middle school, it’s never bothered me!” He’d just wanted to spend some time with other people since he’d been so lonely lately, he’d never meant to hurt Tsukishima like this.

“Oh.” Yamaguchi awkwardly lets go of Tsukishima’s arm and wrings his hands together instead.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel that way at all, I’m really sorry. I just felt lonely when I thought you didn’t want me around as much.”

Another awkward pause in which they both can’t quite look at each other.

“Yamaguchi,” Tsukishima says finally. “You are family. So you can’t not be around. And I’m – good – with that. Are you?”

He feels like he’s filling up with sunlight, the more Tsukishima looks at him expectantly. He smiles wider than he has in weeks, it hurts his face in the best way.

“Yeah, Tsukki. I’m good with that.”

Tsukishima’s mouth quirks a little, almost betraying a tiny, happy smile.

“Let’s eat together today. If you spend so much time around those two, you might become just as absurd.”

“Ok, Tsukki!”

 

He decides to text Tsukishima later that night, since they didn’t actually have a lot of time to talk at school.

_Hey, I never got around to asking you about Tokyo. How was it?_

The reply comes in a couple of minutes.

_It was alright. We spent Saturday playing volleyball with Akashi-san and Bokuto-san. It was troublesome and tiring._

Yamaguchi snickers when he recognises Tsukishima speak for ‘I had a good time and I’m grateful for these friends.’

_On Sunday, we went out for lunch with Kuroo-san’s parents._

_It was nice._

He’s pleased to find that there’s no crushing jealousy and he’s genuinely so incredibly relieved that his best friend is happy.

_I’m glad you had a good time!_

_I studied with Hinata and Kageyama and Yachi-san on Saturday. It was fun! Kageyama’s dad explained the calculus stuff really well! Yachi-san is a really strict teacher, it was a little scary. She’s going to be a great manager this year! She managed to make them really get stuff done! Sunday I mostly just played video games. I missed you._

He’s still smiling about the final reply when he drifts off to sleep.

_I missed you too._

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> concrit appreciated! come say hi on tumblr! arrow-in-your-butt.tumblr.com rly tho please talk to me im lonely.


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